-->*OFFICIAL: Dell XPS M1730 Owner's Lounge*<--

If its been picked up from Dell today, you'll probably get it around Weds/Thurs I reckon

Clean the window, my friend. You're gonna be looking out of it an aweful lot

 

If I don't get a call today then I'll play the hold game tomorrow.I've had alot of experience playing the hold game with AOL =/

Anyway...What do you guys thinks about your M1730?Happy with build quality and performance?Anything your unhappy with hardware or software wise?

Would love to see an upto date review on the M1730 with SLI 8800m GTX

 

What I normally do when I order something, is open the window and listen in on all the cars go by and check for the louder noised engine vans and then jump out of my chair to look if its the delivery guy, sad yes.

 

What would you like to know?

Stability is good.
Performance is awesome - even with the stock driver.
Build quality is excellent.

Very, VERY, happy overall.
You wont be dissappointed, believe me!


I was gonna do another video review, now that I have used the system a fair amount, but dont really know what to say in it, so I left it! lol

 

I grab a beach chair and sit outside the front door.

LOL Im jus kiddin!!

All my orders come to work, like this one did, so I just check in on reception every now and again

 

Hey guys....should be recieving the "Beast" today so I'll be living at the window. Been reading these posts for a week now and feel like I know you XPS lovers. What do you guys do? Like IT, CEO or work at Burger King...I'm in government IT......

 

Things I've been trying to find out...

When GPU's and CPU (OC 3.2Ghz) are at 100% load what sort of temps I'd be looking at.I'm prob gonna use a PS2 emulator with this laptop but it is a very demanding program and will likely push this spec 90% ish+ load.

System stability was something I've been trying to find out.Seems like 3-4 months ago there were alot of problems with SLI and even just using Vista.

Can you upgrade the CPU yourself or via Dells upgrade program?Maybe in a few months I might go for the x9000 or even a mobile quad.

Other than that Ifti review have pretty much got it covered on youtube^^

Has anyone tested Crysis yet with SLI 8800m GTX?There is one benchmark I'm waiting to see.I no theres a review already but thats with the x9000 which somehow has a 30% FPS increase over the x7900.Want to see if theres any truth to that.

 

Here's a question since I can't talk in detail about something I don't have yet. What to do with my Asus G1s? Can't decide weather to give it to my boy or sell it, what do you think?

 

@ veggie

yeah, would be nice to see temp when CPU and GPU are at 100%

Also would be nice to see, how good will Crysis look when you will play with the settings a little bit (you obviously won't be able to run the game on max settings) Also try to run it on different CPU speeds to see if it is really so CPU dependent

haha, sry for so many questions Don't have the lappy yet, and dying to see what this beast is capable of

Oh, and as for CPU apgrade. Dell doesn't do it, but you can always upgrade it yourself and it has been said here before, that the instruction of how to do it is shipped with lappy.

Quad core CPU is coming out end 2008 - beginning 2009. And i don't think our motherboards will be able to run it, so X9000 is really gonna be top CPU we can get

 

my delivery said call lock out too, but they phoned me to ask if i wanted morning or afternoon dilivery, so mines coming tommorow afternoon,

AND MY BOSS GAVE ME THE AFTERNOON OFF!!!!!!

 

Welll Im a sophmore college student in the US going for mechanical engineering. And I work at a highschool not far from here helping kids with science fair projects and getting the lab organized. Unfortunatly i havent even got to order my laptop yet im still dealing with prostar to get my money back which they are delaying as usual

 

I just beat Crysis last night! Anyhow, I was playing on High Settings with a resolution of 1440 x 900. I also had the processor factory overclocked to 3.4. FPS jumped around a little when there were a ton of explosions but on average I had a FPS of 40+.

I'm on XP so I had also used the workaround to be able to use DirectX9 to play the game with the Max 'Very High' Settings. I don't recall the FPS but it played fine if I kept the resolution to 1280x720. If you're just playing on the 17" monitor, the jumps in resolution are not as siginificant in quality as opposed to if you were playing this this output onto a larger monitor or even a bigger hdtv set. There were a couple of hiccups when there was alot going on in the screen but this Beast really impressed!

 

I'm in the Biotech industry on the Autmomation side. Keeping things in a state thats a-ok with the FDA. On the side as a paying hobby i'm a videographer.

 

Im an IT Network Manager of a 13 server & 600 client network, with just over 1500 end users, and manage 2 technicians.
Do I like the work? Well lets just say, it pays the mortgage!! lol

System seems pretty stable for me with 167.55 drivers. Much more then it used to be. With the 8700mGT, things seemed to crash more. I still have only 1 issue though. Just like it did with the 8700, with SLI enabled, I cant use Movie Maker properly. It crashes after a while, With SLI disabled it runs perfect. Thats the only time I ever disable SLI. Im waiting fo rthe Nvidia Beta drivers for the 8800mGTX - hopefully they will be better

The CPU is pretty easily upgraded, you can do it yourself... Dell have already announced that the only upgrade program will be for the GPU. There wil be no upgrade program for the CPU. So if you get your hands on one ou'll have to upgrade it yourself.

If I get my hands on a X9000 I'll create a video of the upgrade, but I really dont think I'll get one eny time soon. Not too interested in it just yet TBH.

What are the performance gains over the X7900?? I know the X9000 runs cooler etc, but performance wise, whats the gain?

 

Lucky git.
I have all of next week off, then the last week and a half in March also. So Im only working 8 days in total in March
Just waiting for my cooler which should come mid-March. Im trying not to game too much til them - the beast runs hot!

 

web applications (java, ajax, database stuff).

How about yourself?

 

About 5-10% depending on application and runs cooler.Not worth waiting for but SSE 4.1 on the x9000 might come in handy for future versions of console emulators

 

I have about 30 servers 1 Wang mainframe and about 300 clients with a mix of Novell, NT and Linux. Large variety of apps. Mostly all Dell clients and Dell, HP servers.

 

Which one are you going to use or could recommend?

 

I'll stick with the x7900 most likely as its plenty powerful for PS2/Gamecube Emus
Just thought a cooler CPU would be nice.

http://www.pcsx2.net/

Thats thebest Emu for PS2 so far and its far from finished.Trust me...You run FFX on this thing with 1600/1200 res and x4 AA and your jaw will hit the ground

Sony could learn a lession from these guys

 

I am a Consultant in Executive Compensation.

IFTI is working in an IT Department.

Don't know about the rest

 

Thanks, I did not realize that this consoles have been successfully emulated. You mentioned Gamecube; is there an emu which can run "Fire Emblem; The Sacred Stones"?

 

http://forums.ngemu.com/news-comments/93136-dolphin-1-03-2-beta-x64-release.html

Thats the best Gamecube Emu atm.
It can run games at playable FPS (Normally to fast and the emu dosen't have a FPS limiter)
It has some serious compatibility issues with 99% of games.I've only tested 2 games with it...

Starfox assault which runs and looks great but for some reason randomly crashes in dual core mode.

Super Smash bros runs good but has alot of stuff missing and the sound its all messed up.

Either emulator the Dell M1730 should run them great with a cpu 2.4Ghz+

 

I'm a game deveoper who works for one of the 3 major console players

 

im a sound engineer at my local school, used to be the network engineer but the music job is more fun!

 

Done the network engineer thing
Product Management
Product Marketing

Now in Technology Marketing in a certain large Amercan network equipment vendor

Still not got a laptop

 

Wow, that's great news! Thx for the reply I totally agree with you about the resolution here. Just was wondering wondering what GPU drivers you used and if you used any extra cooling to run CPU on 3.4 clock speed?

 

For those of you who have the 8800mGTX - at what temps do your fans tend to kick in while just using your laptop for basic tasks, like surfing the net etc. Nothing that stresses the system....

 

When I was playing Crysis yesterday I was just using the stock drivers that came with the system. After I finished though, I went on the Dell website and downloaded the latest 8800 drivers (2/11/08 I think) but had not tried the game with it afterwards. I did not use any extra cooling.

 

I have not yet downloaded / installed temperature software but might try out nTune. When I run the system at 2.8 though and in SLI, my fans have only stayed at the lowest settings (where I can't even hear it). Even when i'm edting 1080i HD footage and rendering out, the fans have stayed low. The only time i've had the fans kick up is when I overclock to anything over 3.0ghz (so within the bios 3.2 and 3.4) and the fans would stay on.

 

Alright. That's great news, thx. Can't wait for mine!!!

 

Hi,

I got my Dell XPS 1730 at the end of December 07. It was a desktop replacement and I must confess I think it's great. I have never owned a laptop before and find this one just right.

Most games I have tried have run very well indeed. However, I paid £1500 for this machine and for a top notch graphics card to come out so soon after my purchase is a slight dissapointment. Hopefully the upgrade will come soon. I now want an 8800

Things I like about the lappy

+The keyboard feels "nice" and "sturdy" and I love the backlit display.
+The LCD, OK I have a sammmy but hey it's still great
+The small logitec display - very handy for info on CPU / mem etc
+The speed
+Vista - better than I thought it would be and even in games it performs OK
+LEDS look cool if a little over the top
+Noise - very quiet
+Sound - better than a normal laptop, could do with a little more base
+Cost - cannot beat the spec for the money, forget Alienware and Rock
+Very few problems - it just works and works very very well. It has been stable and I guess what you expect for a top of the range laptop.

Not so good things

-Ageia Card - waste of time and money
-Looks - hmm it looks nice when open and all "lit up" but when not open it looks like a tomb and i'm not sure which colour is the best, I have crimson red but may change to blue at some point. Whats your fav? Alienware look better imho
-Power pack - Huge, but so what.

I may speak to Dell to see what my options are regarding the upgrade and will let you know as to whether I have any luck.

M1730 XPS (Crimson Red)
T7500 2.2Ghz
2GB Ram
SLI 8700m GT
2x160GB HDD Raid 0
Ageia PhysX 100M Processor

 

I was a little concerned about overclocking to 3.4 hearing about the possibility of the computer getting the BSOD and crashing. I was able to play Crysis for a good 4 or 5 hours straight overlocked (and the built in fans at full blast) with no problems thankfully. Hope you get your system in soon!

 

How loud are the fans at full blast?

 

Hi guys

I've just finished speaking to Dell Australia. I bought my 1730 in October 07 and was hoping to swap my 8700 for 8800. Basically the girl said that after consulting her supervisor and head engieneer they can replace my 8700s with new 8700s but not with 8800s!
I believe I explained really well in my emails why I think the swap is fair.
Did anyone in Australia have more luck in getting new cards?

 

Not sure if you have or have heard an Xbox 360 when its turned on and the fans are running...but if you have, the M1730 fans on full blast are i'd say about half or maybe even 1/3rd as loud as an Xbox 360. While playing Crysis on the M1730 though, I quickly forgot about the sound because the sound of the game drowns out the fan noise. I did not even have the volume turned up that high at all. At one point whie playing, I had to place my head right next to the fans just to hear if they were still up and blasting.

 

Thought you was gonna say its as loud as an xbox360 lol!My 360 sounds like a plane taking off sometimes

Sounds like the M1730 has pretty nice to the ear

 

Kremux mate, I bought one over Christmas with the 8700's. Liked it, but knew the 8800gtx was coming out sometime in the near future, so I made the hard decision of sending it back whilst still in my 15 day money back guarrantee period.

I do believe Australia will get the upgrade option for the 8800's. But you're going to have to be patient, Dell Australia have only just released the 8800's out here, so they will dedicate all of their available stock to processing new purchase orders.

As soon as demand has slowed down, im sure they'll start offering cards for purchase/upgrades. I reckon this will happen in a couple of months.

They'll probably be cheaper by then anyway, and to be honest, your machine can run any game on fairly high settings at the moment.

Purely out of interest, do you know what LCD panel make you have? I got a Samsung on my last one, when I called up about the light leakage and enquiring about an LG panel, I was told by tech support that Australia only gets the Samsung panel...

 

I never remember really hearing the fans? Thats with some solid gaming on demanding games for 3 - 4 hour stints. Might be because of the decent speakers masking the noise though.

From what I've heard, the 8800's do run hotter than the 8700's, so I wouldn't be suprised if you could notice the fans more, whether the noise will be noticable now I dunno.

I'll be picking up a cooler though when I get back to Perth.

 

Well I finally got some time this weekend to play with my laptop.

The Zalman cooler definetly helps, but I do think I'm running hotter then most (possibly because of ambient temperature being 25-27C in my apartment).

I found measuring temperatures to be difficult even with the LCD read out. It would take nearly 2 hours for the temperatures to peak.

Generally speaking, running a graphically intensive game (vanguard full settings, roughly 40fps) I was getting ~84C with the laptop flat down on the desk with no cooler.

Propping it up with a cd or beer cap didn't seem to have much impact on cooling. Maybe a 2C drop (82C ish).

Running it with the cooler on max fan setting (can't hear the fans at all) I was maxing out at 78C.

I tried propping it up on the notebook cooler (with cd or cap as previous) but this didn't appear to make any difference.

Another thing I tried was offsetting the laptop so the laptop's air intake were directly above the cooler's holes....68C max. This had an enormous impact on temperature.

Sorry not too scientific, I really wasn't expecting the temperatures to take that long to stabalize, so these are more or less just ball park figures. I may just modify my cooler and add some air holes at the top to aid in GPU cooling, although running it offset is perfectly stable and it will not slide.

One thing to note is that ony the GPU temps were high. CPU temps were in the 50-60C zone while gaming. I found the CPU was never pegged at 100%. Also, the GPU's idle in the low 60's while on the notebook cooler.

If anyone else gets the cooler can you try similar tests. Record ambiant temperature, then play a graphically intensive game for 2+ hours and see where you end up on the GPU temps. If you can, get everest to record temps while playing on the lcd or log the temperature with ntune. I noticed that if you quit the game then quickly observe the temps it will be very innacurate. From the time the game takes to unload and return you to desktop it would easily drop 10C, you need to record in game temperatures.

 

Does the Zalman cooler give you the option of moving where the fans are located? If it does, you could position them more accurately for better cooling...

 

No, it doesn't work like that. It's an aluminium plate with holes halfway down the plate. The fans are upright and feed air to the base. The fans are mounted in place, and even if you could move them it wouldn't do anything. You have to look at some pictures to really understand how it works.

I still think this is the best fan on the market for this notebook, but it would definetly be better if the holes spanned the entire length of the plate rather then just the bottom half. The battery and hard drives are definetly staying cool with this setup. I found the palm rests are much cooler on the notebook cooler, the only thing really keeping them warm is your body heat.

I'm still going to look at a better solution, maybe re-manufature the plate so it's pretty much opposite to what it is now (holes on top half instead of bottom half).

 

Want to know exactly what everyone in this thread is talking about with the Zalman cooler?

Here's what it looks like and how it works:



Full product description can be found here: Zalman NC2000

 

Also, the Zalman cooler comes in Black and Silver on the top plate. Given the m1730 design, the fashion conscious should go with black I would say. Although, Ifti has been reporting a shortage of stock, so maybe just get what you can lay your hands on if this cooler is up your alley.

 

It really is a nice cooler. Quiet, solid, etc.

It's just that the spot you need the most cooling is the exact spot where the zalman cooler has the least amount of cooling.

As I stated above, my having the laptop's intake fans in line with these holes it drops the GPU temps by an additional 10C over and beyond the already great cooling it provides. That's a total of 16C drop compared to just having the laptop sitting on the desk. It just bugs me to have to use it this way. I don't understand why Zalman placed the holes only on the bottom of the plate. If you look at all the other coolers they focus on cooling the "top" portion of the cooler. By going against the standard they've diminished the coolers ability to function with the XPS M1730.

http://www.overclockercafe.com/Reviews/other_misc/Lian_Li_NC-01/1001.htm is a much better design, i Just don't know if it fits with XPS or not.

edit: Checked the dimensions, no go. this is for a 15" laptop. They do make one for 17" but it's still too small for the M1730. Our laptops require a 20" notebook cooler (it's the same dimensions as a 20"). I think I'm just going to modify my ZM-NC2000B by adding more holes at the top to enhance it's GPU cooling ability. I could measure out the dimensions exactly and simply provide more holes where the GPU intake fans are, I don't think the CPU needs more cooling as the temperature is already very low.

 

That could work. You'd have to take it apart and drill more holes in the top - I just wonder if there is some ducting preventing the air from coming through at the top. I guess you won't know till you open it up.

 

Same here. Fans always tend to work at low speed, which is cool since you can only just hear them. When gaming they do go a little faster, but not full blast.

The only time I ever heard the fan at full blast when when I overclocked to 3.4GHz. Maybe for other people this wasnt an issue, but for me, I felt it was a lot louder then I expected! Ive never really heard the CPU fan at all before, but I definately heard it after overclocking!
Ive not really heard the GPU fans at full blast though....

Why do you feel it is a fair swap? You are trying to get an expensive update for free, with your arguement being what exactly?

I dont mean to sound rude, but I do agree with Dell on this one. You purchased your system a few months ago with the 8700mGT. How and why would you expect them to just be swapped for free for a more expensive card which is quite a bit more expensive!

Thats like trying to upgrade your desktop card to a newer GPU just because a new one has been released.

Im afraid thats just how technology is, especially GPUs. Newer models are coming out very fast, and we just have to deal with it. Requesting an upgrade to a newer model for free isnt the way to go about it, unless you are having severe problems with the 8700mGT and have been in contact with Dell continually, or have had the card swapped out several times already - in that case you could have an arguement.

What I do agree on, is that Dell should also think of the early adopters like yourself. Rather then announcing an upgrade program, and then not hearing anything for another 6 weeks, especially while new customers are able to purchase the 8800's, is, in my opinion, poor customer service. Dell should have ensured that as soon as the card was available for new customers, current customers have the chance to upgrade also. Its not fair to keep them hanging on - at least offer some kind of explanation or timeline. Yet they offer nothing.

The upgrade program should have started as soon as the 8800 was available in new systems.

Then again, Dell are a large business. Their aim is profit. They know that those who want to upgrade have no other option then to wait, and cant purchase from elsewhere. They can afford to keep them customers waiting while they reap the benefits and profits from more sales. Once that dies down a little, they offer the upgrade program, and make another ton of money. Good business plan, but bad customer relation.

I completely agree. It seems to be the best on the market, and I have mine ordered, but several pages back I raised the same concern - that the holes were in the wrong place. I was told the air is distributed across the entire underside of the laptop, so not to worry. Seems like your tests show otherwise.

I dont think the fans can be moved, since they are housed at the thicker end of the cooler, and wouldnt fit if moved down any further towards the bottom.

The only solution I can see is if extra holes can be made in the plate at the top - where they are most needed. I dont see why Zalman didnt think of just covering the netire plate rather then the bottom 2/3 of it!

Your tests clearly show that if the laptop intake vent is placed above the air holes in the cooler, the tempertaure drop is substantial. This is therefore how I intend to plac ethe laptop for now. Not ideal I know, but as long as it does the job Im fine with it, while we look for a solution as to how to get the cooling at the top as well!!

Thanks for your tests.
Do you have any pics of the cooler, and what it looks like with the laptop when its placed a bit further down above the cooler holes? Im curious as to how far down the laptop needs to be to get the cooler air.......

I found the silver in stock on only 1 online retailer. I wanted black though. I have it on order, but seems like no-one is getting stock til around mid-March!

Good point. You could drill more holes at the top, but that doesnt mean air will get to them holes. We wont know until one is opened up so we can see what the duct inside is like. It could be ducting all the air towards the bottom of the cooler where the holes currently air, meaning even with new holes drilled at the top, the air still goes to the bottom!

The good thing about this though, is that the HDD's also get a little cooling, which is good since at the moment they get no cooling whatsoever. Having 2 HDDs running in Raid can make it pretty hot in there - especially with the drives almost touching each other in their caddy!

So if you place the laptop a bit further down on the cooler, are the HDDs still above the cooler exhaust holes so they get cooler air as well??

Man, if someone created a cooler specially for the M1730 they could make some fast money!!! As Kermit1979 said, the holes really need to cover the top half of the cooler, rather then the bottom half.

 

wow, just realised how long my above post was!! lol

 

Oh cool - my M1730 backpack has just sold via eBay!! Thats the cost of the cooler covered

Still trying to save a bit of money so I can start my own forum, never seem to get round to it!

 

Lol, ifti that was a long post!

You guys raise a valid point about the Zalman cooler! I didn't really think about the positioning of the laptop on the cooler...

Kermit, any chance we could see some pic's of the laptop placed in the optimum position on the cooler?